The devil is in the details

Thoughts upon returning to Boston...

1.) Banff is beautiful. In fact, it is so beautiful that after a while you get jaded, and keep looking around at "just another pretty mountain." The conference was good, learned lots, and had an excellent time hanging with co-workers. There is plenty more to say (as well as pictures) but you will see why I am cutting it short in a second...

2.) Sony sucks. On the flight from Calgary to Chicago on Friday, we took out my laptop to watch a DVD. It almost finished starting up, and then it automatically restarted. Fortunately both me and the other grad student that I was sitting with knew a bit about computers and we were able to diagnose the problem (at least we thought): a high-level driver failure. The computer still started in safe mode, so we figured that I would just have to back-up my recent documents (and Banff pictures!) and then re-format. Obviously, it would suck, but it wasn't the end of the world. Backing up worked perfectly well, but the computer then refused to reinstall Windows correctly. Repeatedly. I spent most of my day yesterday trying to fix it, and a long time on the phone with Sony tech support today. The end result is that I have to send it to Sony AGAIN for repairs. (For those of you not aquainted with my computer woes, I bought the vaio in early October and it's hard drive had to be replaced in late October.) They think that there is either a problem with the hard drive (again!) or with the video card (which would apparently require the motherboard to be replaced.) I sure you can tell just how excited I am about this prospect. After all of this fabulousness, I went to the lab to get my old, decrepit laptop, which I am currently using now and will continue to use for the next week or two. This is pretty much my first time with much in the way of internet access since Thursday night, so for all of you who emailed me about things to do this weekend....sorry. I've got to deal with all of the little issues that came up over the week while I was away, but I will hopefully have time to play again tomorrow night or so. (Hopefully by that time I will also be back on Boston time instead of this weird zombie time that I am on now.)

3. Claritin is the best invention ever. Only Tivo and the Ipod even come close. I was rather harshly reminded that I am a human pollen-meter when I woke up yesterday. Ugggh. I might try to get in to see the allergist this week.

4. The Big Dig is sucky. It's rather impossible to get to the airport right now. My cab on Saturday morning got all the way to a tunnel which it then realized was closed and had to take a long detour, and my ride Friday night got very lost leaving the airport. Good luck to anyone who wants to travel between Storrow and the airport.

5. I love sunshine. :)

posted by Immunegirl @ 8:12 PM